


Chosen by His Hands

by SubtextEquals



Category: Spartacus Series (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-29
Updated: 2017-01-29
Packaged: 2018-09-20 16:55:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,742
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9500888
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SubtextEquals/pseuds/SubtextEquals
Summary: Soulmates carry each other's names on their wrists-- but not everyone is fortunate enough to have a soulmate. Nasir considers it a misfortune not to have a name on his wrist. But as he grows to appreciate his freedom, he realizes that one's choices have power over fate.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I previously wrote a soulmark fic but wanted to expand it. After forgetting about it for years, I realized that I wouldn't ever write it as far in the timeline as I wanted but I left it at a good place to end after some tweaking. So enjoy this newly dusted off fic.

Not everyone bore a name on their wrist. Nasir never had, even when he was a young boy in Syria. Any mark that signified his soulmate did not blemish his skin. If it had ever bothered him once that stopped as he gained position as slave, from simple body slave to amanuensis. It might even have played a hand in his appointment to it.

Then he was freed and the absence of it became another signifier of loss. He’d had his identity stripped from him, thrust into freedom against his will, and now he had no promise of a future.

Chadara found him once, briefly, before seeking a position of her own. Once learning his thoughts, she showed him her own wrists. The name had faded beyond recognition, worse since the last time Nasir had laid eyes on it.

“It can be best never to know what you have missed,” she told him. “I seek my own path. You should as well.”

Her own path involved taking up with someone she didn’t care about.

Nasir quickly learned not to concern himself with it, Chadara or the mark. Spartacus trained him hard each day until his arms were sore and he sought his rest in the corner of the temple.

“It gives you pain?” Agron asked. He took a seat beside Nasir and nodded toward his arms, which Nasir had been stretching.

Nasir stilled himself. “None I cannot bear.”

Agron smiled but it froze on his face when he caught sight of Nasir’s wrist.

Nasir brought his hands to his chest and shot Agron a dark look.

It was a look that Agron ignored. “Tomorrow we leave for another villa. Do you know shortest path?”

“We had no cause to frequent other villas.”

Agron shrugged. “We will find way.”

“Do you believe we will find Naevia?” Nasir asked.

“Crixus will not stop unless she is dead or in his arms.” He shook his head. “A foolish cause, pursuit of one who has surely passed.”

“Would you not do same?” Nasir had none to call his. The idea was foreign to him, but he could imagine.

“At risk of entire fucking rebellion?” He scoffed. “I hold more sense than that.”

Glancing away from his eyes, Nasir noticed Agron’s forearm was covered by a brace. Only the B of Batiatus was visible.

The next morning, before they left the villa Nasir found a scrap of fabric and coiled it around his wrist.

 

Nasir said nothing about Agron’s decision to lie to Crixus about Naevia and in doing so drew himself into the lie. The most they mentioned it was the time Nasir nearly went to him and Agron stopped. What he said made sense. It was reasonable. It still felt wrong.

And, after Nasir had told Crixus, after the truth spilled out of his mouth, Agron still had nothing to say on the subject. A bitter, angry glance in his direction. Nasir averted his gaze, heart sinking, and turned.

“Nasir,” Agron called.

Nasir lifted his gaze and looked back.

“Do you have account of all we carry?”

The tension did not melt away between them but there was more ease to their actions around each other than before.

 

Nasir remembered little of the passing of time. His own heartbeat felt thready in his chest, something faltering although he didn’t move. Naevia was beside him-- he thought it was Naevia. If he had the mind for it, he would question his chance of survival though he’d known from the moment the blade pierced him it was low.

A hand touched his chin, tilting his head up. His eyes took a moment to focus but when they did he took in Agron’s concerned face. Too tired to even consider he might be a dream, Nasir started to smile.

He didn’t think Agron would come. He should have known.

His wrist itched.

He passed out.

 

It bothered him off and on, the itching in his wrist that he was too weak to scratch. He thought something might have crawled under the brace in the woods but when he asked Naevia to remove it she said that nothing was there. When he had the strength to glance down he confirmed it. There was nothing. Nothing had changed.

He staggered to his feet. Ignoring the protests of the medicus his feet carried him to where Spartacus stood talking to the others.

Straightening, drawing on all his strength, he reached them. “Where do we go?”

Agron beamed and touched his cheek even as Nasir’s offer was rejected.

“This time you stay and I go,” he told him.

Nasir felt that ever indefinable feeling, spreading out from his stomach, a certain lightness that curved his lips into a smile.

Until Agron kissed him.

Nasir blinked. His eyes cast to the side before landing back on Agron, who still smiled at him. Hesitantly, Nasir returned it though confusion took hold. Before he could voice any questions, Spartacus called Agron back and Nasir watched as he gave a speech. Agron glanced back once. He gave him one more smile, perhaps for the last time, before he left.

 

Nasir’s wrist itched off and on and he idly rubbed it, thinking no more of it even after Naevia asked about it. Once he showed her, she’d made no comment on the lack of a name on his wrist. Not everyone had a soulmate. Not everyone was meant to be. Not like the name she carried: Crixus.

“You care for Agron?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said. Keeping himself from glancing down at his wrist, he added-- “as much as I can.”

Naevia hesitated, then held up her arm. “I once bore no name.”

The statement hung heavy in the air between them. Nasir couldn’t properly put to words a response. And he still couldn’t, even when he saw Agron return from the Arena. What he could do was laugh with him, let what he felt take over, and kiss him.

 

Nasir lay beside Agron, who remained seated. His hand absently stroked Nasir’s hair. He hadn’t removed his brace. Just because Nasir had none was no guarantee for Agron. Few were born without. Another name might lie etched upon that skin. Another person, someone he was meant to be with while Nasir provided comfort in this momentary storm that had enveloped him. But what could he hope for himself? A love like Crixus and Naevia’s? No, this was all he himself could hope for.

“Where do thoughts take you?” Agron asked.

However their friendship had started, Nasir did not want to lie to him. But evading-- that was something he had learned well. “To a question not to be posed.”

“Give voice to it.”

Not well enough. Nasir turned his face so he could look up at Agron. “What does brace cover?”

“If question asked a week past answer given would be nothing.” Agron pulled his brace off.

Nasir sat up to see it. Agron turned his arm to reveal the inside of his wrist. There was a splotch of black, resembling ink, moving across his skin. It did not stay in the same place for long.

“Mark has yet to form.”

Nasir stared. There was truth in Agron’s words. It had not straightened or curved. There were no signs or letters. But they could both guess what it might be once set.

“Naevia said it was possible.” If he believed Naevia, why did he hear doubt in his own voice? Nasir felt the itch in his own wrist and he questioned that too.

“I have not heard of it.” He paused. “What of yours?” Agron asked.

Nasir unwound the cloth, curious himself what was there and disappointed to see that it remained blank.

Agron touched his cheek and kissed his forehead. “You may yet create own fate.”

Fate. Nasir had spent so long at the whims of it that he held not certainty he would choose anything.

 

Finally, after so many weeks pushing for it, they were to raid Neapolis for more men. Agron was to leave tomorrow. Neither of them were comfortable spending that night with the rest of the slaves so they found the basement. It was cooler, damper, but it afforded them privacy as Agron spread him out on the floor. He cupped the back of Nasir’s head in his hand and, while Nasir was focused on Agron’s lips, Agron’s eyes must have strayed.

He laughed. “Nasir.” He pulled away and held out his hand, tilting it to emphasize the inside of his wrist.

Nasir rubbed his hands over the letters. While he had never been taught how to read, these symbols were recognizable to all, regardless of language or literacy.

_Nasir._

“Fucking fate is chosen.” Agron grinned before bringing their lips, and, more carefully, their bodies together.

“Mine--” Nasir thought to his wrist, only showing the vaguest hints of a mark and nothing close to strong and distinct, however much it itched.

“Make own choice, Nasir. It is yours to seize.” Agron kissed his neck, his lips brushing along his skin.

Nasir’s inner wrist burned.

 

Atop Vesuvius, Nasir helped twist the vines into rope. He did not need to ask Spartacus’s plan to peer into his mind. One was for Agron. While the rest of them waited, it would be up to Spartacus, Crixus, Agron, and one other to distract the Roman soldiers. Fight them. Risk their lives. Die so they might live.

He glanced up to see Agron in counsel with Spartacus. As soon as his eyes fixed on Agron’s face, the near constant burning in his skin eased. Instead, his wrist flooded with a coolness that stretched out across his nerves and to his elbow. Pulling away his brace, he glanced at the black scribble that had been there. Had but no longer was.

_Agron._

Agron turned away from Spartacus and came within reach of him.

“Agron,” Nasir said. He was beyond words and held out his arm as soon as Agron looked his way.

Agron ran his fingers along the letters on his skin, causing Nasir to burn in a far different way. Then he raised his eyes to Nasir’s and drew him into a kiss. “I will see you from here,” he promised. “And you by my side.”

“I will not stray,” Nasir said. A promise that meant more when not dictated by fate.

Countless years spent as a slave, but the most important choice had been his own.


End file.
